


The Equinox, the Turning of the Tide

by RoseinMyHand



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 2015 Johnlock Christmas Exchange, JustJohnLockStuff 2015 Johnlock Christmas Exchange, M/M, Pining, Post-Episode: s03e03 His Last Vow, Unsolvable Problems and How to Solve Them, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-28
Updated: 2015-12-28
Packaged: 2018-05-09 22:08:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5557331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseinMyHand/pseuds/RoseinMyHand
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"It isn't you I can't forgive, Sherlock." John closes his eyes. "None of the things you've... had to do, would have happened, if..." The next part is harder and John castigates himself for his hesitation, his weakness. "My fault. I can't ever forgive myself," he manages to clip out between pressed lips…</p><p> </p><p>  <i>          "What have I ever done ... hmm? ... my whole life ..."</i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>          "Everything... everything you’ve ever done is what you did."</i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>          "Why is everything ... always ... MY FAULT?!"</i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>          "Your way. Always your way."</i></p><p> </p><p>John's anguished shout and bitter capitulation echo again in Sherlock’s mind.  He hears it pitch perfect and appalling, every day.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Equinox, the Turning of the Tide

**Author's Note:**

> A gift for sheepcereal, for the justjohnlockstuff 2015 Johnlock Christmas Exchange.
> 
> With so much gratitude to may-shepard for the masterful beta and all the Hellions for their encouragement of this first-time author. Reach exceeding grasp, and etc.

“You made-” starts John.

“me stand there-” starts Sherlock.

“-and watch,” finish John and Sherlock, nearly simultaneously.

“What?” John sputters, folding his arms across his chest. “What did I make _you_ watch, Sherlock?” 

Sherlock’s mouth snaps closed and his lips thin. “So much for your vaunted forgiveness, then,” Sherlock wills his eyes not to slide toward the violin, or the ring on John's finger - not to answer John’s question. He turns back to slotting sanitized slides into their box.

“Sherlock, I…” John stops, his mouth dry and gluey. How had they gotten from the incoherent, frustrating crime scene to standing around 221B having this exhausted argument? And when he goes home, he knows there will be another, unwinnable argument waiting for him there, Mary’s mouth pulled up into a moue of unimpeachable hurt that never reaches her calculating eyes. “Forgiveness is not my strong point,” he admits, edging closer to the kitchen, to Sherlock.

“It’s fine, John.” Sherlock's hands come to rest on the filled box, task complete.

“No.” John grabs the back of the chair, _his_ chair. “No.”

“Your forgiveness has been called upon quite frequently, I know, John. It’s fine.” Sherlock does not turn around, puts all his effort into standing stock-still, but his right upper trapezius spasms.

John flexes his hands, letting go of the chair, vibrating with an arrested movement toward Sherlock. “That’s true. But I did forgive you, Sherlock. I had.”

Now Sherlock whirls around in a blur of tartan dressing gown and disordered curls. “Past tense. What’s changed?”

“What’s changed?” sniffs John. A grin and a grimace snarl together and drag across his face before sliding down into despair. John’s shoulders hunch up under the bulk of vest, shirt and jumper and his eyes are pulled, ineluctably, to Sherlock’s chest, where the scar lies. He watches as Sherlock parses his statement, as his eyes unfocus and he sways minutely from foot to foot. John feels his own feet move apart in response, and he squares his shoulders.

Sherlock’s attention snaps back to the present, to John, to 221B. “What time is it?”

Automatically, John answers. “Half eleven.”

As he has done innumerable times since meeting Sherlock, John decides that the pressure in his chest is not the first warning sign of myocardial infarction. He can’t be deflected, distracted this time. His intention must be clear, because Sherlock begins to fidget, edging toward the sink and turning away at an awkward angle. They can no longer make direct eye contact.

Now that John can only see him in profile, Sherlock jams his hands in the pockets of the dressing gown, where they can shake unseen. He allows the left side of his mouth to pull in. Really, this caution is unnecessary since John is, in the main, either unable or unwilling to read his tells. With this rueful reminder, Sherlock steadies himself and waits for what is to come.

Without the confusion of Sherlock's direct gaze, John is able to think again. He admonishes himself. He has resolved to end this confusion many times and has thus far always failed. An indrawn breath and - 

"It isn't you I can't forgive, Sherlock." John closes his eyes. "None of the things you've... had to do, would have happened, if..." The next part is harder and John castigates himself for his hesitation, his weakness. "My fault. I can't ever forgive myself," he manages to clip out between pressed lips…

_"What have I ever done ... hmm? ... my whole life ..."_

_"Everything... everything you’ve ever done is what you did."_

_"Why is everything ... always ... MY FAULT?!"_

_"Your way. Always your way."_

John's anguished shout and bitter capitulation echo again in Sherlock’s mind. He hears it pitch perfect and appalling, every day. 

Something about John’s voice tonight is different - this repetition is John, hollowed out. John is accepting the responsibility, blaming himself, hating himself. John has capitulated. He is resigned to a life of failure, convinced some deficiency of his character causes the pain of those around him. His despair itches at Sherlock. The sensation crawls down his arms and his spine, cores out his sternum. 

John was never meant to believe Sherlock’s lie for longer than the span of that high-wire conversation; but Sherlock now sees that to John it had been the final proof of a life-long fear. The belief had seeped down into John’s very bones, leading him to concede defeat in a battle long fought. Sherlock had made him accept the lie of his essential culpability to buy them time, and John had believed him.

Sherlock stands aghast. He had intended...he hadn’t thought. Why hadn’t he thought? Why had he thought that pressing on that particular bruise would not have lasting consequences? He had known it would be effective, had indeed chosen this particular balancing act of John’s psychology because it was the quickest way to bring him round. He had never meant to be brutal. Did John...was John acting under the influence of this belief since that night?

Sherlock closes his eyes against the cascade of answered questions - John, collapsed under the weight of Sherlock’s stratagem; John, silent, in Sherlock’s hospital room. John, silent, as Sherlock urges him to forgive Mary.

John, silent, as Sherlock, hazy from pain meds, reaches out for his hand.

John, holding Sherlock’s hand, silent.

John, leaving, silent.

John, giving away half his clothing (the good half), silent. John, sorting his papers, silent. John reducing his belongings until he could once again fit his life into one suitcase and two boxes.

John taking Mary back, inexplicably somber.

John, always, always protecting Sherlock. 

John visiting, listless.

John, leaving, restless.

John, believing it is himself from whom Sherlock needs protection.

“John!” Sherlock’s voice surprises him by breaking and he turns fully away, abashed.

“No, Sherlock, I know what I need to do. I’ve been cowardly, but that’s done with.” John’s voice is alive again, but it reaches Sherlock’s ears as if it had to crawl over broken glass to get there. 

“None of the things you’ve had to do would have been necessary, if I hadn’t been a weight, dragging you down, holding you back. So, I should…” John had started the sentence determined to do the right thing for once, but the pain in his chest is expanding into his throat and he is unable to finish.

John takes a breath to try again as Sherlock waits, horrified. John is about to apologize his way out of Sherlock’s life, leave behind the last fragments of their once-shared life. John is going to leave for the last time, thinking it the only reparation he can make, however inadequate. John will leave, go home to Mary, accepting that he deserves no better than a life empty of respect or affection.

Sherlock is paralyzed. Unlike on a case, this flood of insight leaves him panicked and immobile. How can he repair the damage his desperate ploy has wreaked when it has cemented John’s own life-long fear and doubt? How can he convince John when he cannot even turn around, cannot look him in the face?

John’s hand alights on Sherlock’s shoulder blade with the gentlest possible pressure. He has noticed Sherlock’s distress after all.

Silence.

Silence, lengthening out into a goodbye.

Sherlock begins to turn around, delicately, slowly. He reaches for John’s left hand, surprising John into stillness. Their hands hold in the space between them, their eyes locked and searching. For an instant, the draw between them feels unweighted by the years between the first time they had stood like this and now.

John’s face is the first to fall. John the first to remember. His guilt burns at his eyes and wells up into his throat, bitter. He pulls at his hand, but Sherlock keeps his own wrapped around tightly.

“John, I’d be dead if we had not met.” Sherlock spits, vicious and frantic.

“Sure, maybe that first time, yeah -” John begins.

“No. Not just then, all the time since, I’d be dead. I’d be dead, John, if we had not met.” Sherlock knows he is treading a thin line, is revealing too much, knows he has to take the chance after the damage he had done. Maybe John deserves to know - will it help? If only John stops blaming himself, it will be worth it, even if it leaves Sherlock open to John’s disdain or worse, his pity.

“You _were_ dead, anyway, Sherlock.” The tremor in John’s hand increases. To compensate, Sherlock holds on tighter. 

“My wife shot you.” The resignation in John’s voice as he says _my wife_ is chilling. John drops his eyes from Sherlock’s to their hands in the space between them. All the energy drains out of his face and body. His hand is a dead weight, supported only by inertia and Sherlock’s grasp. John is engulfed by the grey of his current life. Despair is all that is left after cessation of all feeling; exhaustion the only sensation. John’s voice when he speaks next is void of inflection or intonation.

“It was my fault. I should g-”

“No!” Sherlock interrupts, slapping his free hand backward against the kitchen cabinet door.

John’s head snaps up, alert, his eyes alive and assessing at the sudden sound.

“No.” repeats Sherlock. “I would have been dead before Moriarty, if we had not met, John.”

John’s face, which had begun to sink back into self-loathing, transforms into bewilderment. Sherlock still holds John’s wrist and hand in his own. John has not tried to pull it back since his initial attempt.

Silence.

Sherlock turns John’s hand over and smoothes out the fingers. At the feeling of Sherlock’s thumb swiping over his palm and wrist, John inhales.

“A lot of things have happened since we met, John.” 

Sherlock is now undeniably cradling John’s hand in his own. John is caught between terror and fascination. Should he allow Sherlock to say whatever he is preparing to say?

Looking up into Sherlock’s eyes, John’s disbelief surges. He yanks his hand away.

“It’s late. I’d better be off.” John begins to march toward the hallway door, admonishing himself again that any flicker of hope for a better future wrongs Sherlock.

“You’ll come back tomorrow to help.” Sherlock prompts.

“Yeah, sure,” John mumbles.

“You have absolutely no intention of doing so.” Sherlock’s face draws up into it’s most haughty arrangement. “You’ll text me tomorrow with some excuse. You won’t come back.”

John’s guilt engulfs him, settles on him like a lead blanket. Is there nothing he can do right?

“It’s. It’s not, not you, Sherlock.”

“Oh, I know that. How could it _ever_ be me?” Sherlock’s retort snaps out, a bitter response to a statement John had not made or meant to make.

“No, I mean. Look, hmm.... I, slow you down. I put you in danger. I hold you _back_.” As each word is ground out of his mouth, John feels the truth of them and despairs. The bleakness of his world hems him in.

Sherlock grasps his hand again. “You do not, John. You are invaluable. You protect me, John Watson.” John can hear a curious stress in Sherlock’s voice, but is unable to interpret it.

As John blinks, Sherlock presses his cheek and then lips to the center of John’s palm and then quickly drops his hand and steps out of John’s personal space.

“Sherlock...” John flinches to hear how much like a prayer that single word sounds. Sherlock’s face is still, artificially so, unreadable. John’s palm has the imprint of Sherlock’s forehead, his eyelashes, his nose, and his lips, phosphorescing.

Silence.

“Please believe me, and do me the kindness of allowing me to make my own choices regarding with whom I do and do not associate. I am not a child, John.”

“Of course you’re not a child, Sh-”

“Then I do not need anyone to act on my behalf, against my own wishes. Do not do something you think noble that neither of us actually want.”

John pushes out a mirthless laugh. “Of course, you knew.”

“That you are thinking of terminating our friendship in order to protect me? Yes.”

John’s mouth compresses as he draws in a breath through his nose. “How? No, don’t tell me. I know I’m no puzzle.” The slide from admiration to bitterness is rapid and John’s hurt lingers, even as his voice fades.

“Don’t, John. Don’t stop being my friend." Sherlock’s voice softens the silence that follows. John stares, shocked at the plea.

“No...Sherlock, I wouldn’t...I could never…” The words trickle out of John, precursors to a flood; the emotion dammed up within welling over, ready to sweep everything clean.

This time, Sherlock moves with dizzying rapidity to reach for John’s hand. John meets him halfway, holding his hand out as if to shake on an understanding, but Sherlock turns John’s hand palm up and holds it in both of his own.

Silence.

This time, the silence is burning, aching, sweet.

Moving so slowly that John feels as if his sense of time passing has been broken beyond repair, Sherlock’s lips imprint a kiss onto John’s palm, onto John’s memory.

Just a minute shift of fingers leads to Sherlock’s beautiful face cradled in John’s hand. Disbelieving, John holds his hand still as Sherlock sighs, nestling down. John’s suspicions begin to rise again - and then Sherlock transfixes him by turning his face against John’s palm to place another, unmistakable kiss.

“John.” Sherlock breathes against John’s palm, against that hand so strong and so gentle. “John.” Sherlock places his right hand on John’s bicep, not drawing him any closer, but increasing their points of contact. John’s hand still shelters Sherlock’s face and Sherlock’s fans out the fingers of his other hand across the back of it, holding him there.

“Sherlock?” John’s voice is a cry of desperation, a broken bone protruding through the skin.

They are at arm’s length, yet they breathe in time. Inhaling, trying to exist solely in this moment, and not the next, Sherlock closes his eyes. John’s arm under his fingertips, his palm against Sherlock’s cheek - this rare physical expression may be all he ever has of John. Opening his eyes, Sherlock affirms “John,” and then step further away, arms falling reluctantly to his sides and a bittersweet smile crooking his mouth. 

Uncertain and apprehensive, John’s bereft hand remains in the space between them for a long moment. Inchoate questions surging in his mind, upending his world, he feels - nothing like hope - but doubt receding. John’s eyes drink in Sherlock’s face.

Sherlock allows his control over his features to slip for a single heartbeat, letting John see everything - whatever John is ready to perceive. He is not sure what he has given away, what John is capable of understanding. He walks past John, toward where their coats hang. He runs his hand down the sleeve of John’s shooting jacket, assuring himself it has dried adequately before he shakes it out and holds it open for John.

“Sherlock?” John’s voice wavers between wonder and incredulity.

“You’ll come back to-”

John interrupts, his tone fervent: “Tomorrow, yes. Yes.”


End file.
